Paris, 22 Jul 2022
In the context of the Green Buildings cooperation with the International Development Finance Cub (IDFC), PEEB organized in July 2022 an expert-led workshop to share insights on the Green Climate Fund (GCF) among development finance institutions. Five banks from Latin America, Africa and Europe attended the session.
Experts from the consulting firm E Co. who have been supporting PEEB in its appraisal process with the Green Climate Fund since 2020 facilitated the workshop. The experts started the session by a presentation of the GCF’s governance structures, their priorities in the buildings sector and practicalities of securing funding. Key pathways for climate impact of the GCF are decarbonisation of urban energy systems, energy efficiency in building stock, compact and resilient urban development as well as circular urban economy. They specified that GCF is currently prioritising climate change adaptation projects.
The experts also pointed to the complexity of the GCF’s governance structures and appraisal procedures. Participants from AFD and CABEI/BCIE shared their experience with the Green Climate Fund and confirmed having encountered similar difficulties during the appraisal and approval processes. The challenges are mainly due to the number of iterations with GCF, the difficulty to predict board decisions and to align procedures of accredited entities with the GCF.
The session highlighted that development finance institutions should familiarize themselves with the governance structures, priorities and procedures of the Green Climate Fund and underlined that the GCF is an essential instrument to provide technical assistance grants and concessional loans to leverage climate finance at scale for developing countries and emerging economies. Sectors such as infrastructure and built environment, which are particularly difficult to decarbonise and adapt to climate change, could particularly benefit from GCF support.